Posted
by
Unknown Lamer
on Wednesday January 15, 2014 @01:17PM
from the make-science-not-war dept.

sciencehabit writes "The ghost of former President George W. Bush permeates the 2014 budget that Congress released this week. His presence is good news for physical scientists, but less cheery for biomedical researchers, as Congress reserved some of the biggest spending increases for NASA and the Department of Energy. The National Institutes of Health, meanwhile, got a $1 billion increase that is drawing mixed reviews from research advocates."

The biggest increase (in raw dollars) in R&D spending in recent years (both defense and non-defense) happened under Bush's administration [aaas.org]. Obama has more or less been holding non-defense R&D spending steady until it spiked last year, while cutting defense R&D.

In my book, holding a past increase steady warrants credit too (Obama resisted the urge to cut it back down to save money). But credit for bringing us up to current levels has to go to Bush. (Lots more pretty graphs to look at. [aaas.org])